and amy walter, also of our newshour and washington week families.'s with the "cook political report." this is a tough night for all of us. i know you each have so much you want to say about gwen. i'm going to start with you, kevin merida, because i think you've known gwen the longest. tell us about meeting her. >> it was incredible. i was editor of a black student newspaper at boston university and we did a piece on gwen because here she was this hot-shot journalist right out of college that got hired by the boston herald american, and for many young black journalists or aspiring black journalists, we didn't know many people like gwen, and, so, she felt late bit like a unicorn then. so we became friends after that. burr that was my first introduction to her. she was a wonderful friend, obviously, and inspired many of us throughout our careers. >> sreenivasan: john dickerson, you met gwen on the campaign trail covering politics and then became friends. >> yeah, all i have been thinking about today is her smievment you could read by the light of gwen'

sreenivasan: also ahead this monday: a special pre-election edition of our politics monday panel-- amy walter, susan page, and andra gillespie on the final sprint. >> woodruff: plus, one year later-- how life for one syrian family has changed since moving to america, the challenges they still face. >> i don't know in which country i would be better, because my family some of them in turkey, some in syria, and some in

amy, walter -- amy walter, andra gillespie, susan page, thank you. >> thank you. >> woodruff: join usr our special live coverage. >> election day 2016, the less torque end to a long campaign. who will voters elect as the next president of the united states? which party will control congress? what else will we learn from the voters? join pbs "newshour" for special election night coverage, analysis you won't find anywhere else. tuesday november 8, starting at 8:00, 7:00 central only on pbs. >> sreenivasan: in this campaign, the topic of refugees from war torn syria have been a political flashpoint-- we want to look at what it's been like for refugees themselves. in 2015, under 1,700 syrian refugees were re-settled in the united states. this year, that number has shot up to more than 12,000-- a significant increase, but few in comparison to canada, which has taken in 33,000 this year, or europe, which has absorbed hundreds of thousands of people fleeing the war at home. last year, special correspondent marcia biggs introduced us to one syrian family that arrived in the u.s. as part of th

amy walter? >> hi, judy. hello. think this may play out in the house tonight, as we're watching these results come in, if the results play out as the poll numbers have suggested, where the democrats are going to pick up seats will be in places that were formerly republican, inner suburbs that were very republican for much of our history. now trending more democratic as white college-educated voters move into the democratic column, as working-class whites have moved out, white educated voters have moved into the democratic column. and at the same time in place like the iron range in minnesota, that upper-world part of minnesota, you can see republicans winning there, a district that democrats have held for many, many, many, many years. so it's really like a tale of two congressional districts. we're going to swap out the suburbs for the more rural areas. this has been happening over the last ten years, but sort of at an accelerated pace i think this election cycle. >> woodruff: stuart stevens, are nancy pelosi's expe

amy walter? >> yeah. this was state that he was supposed to win.d that the polls that had come out of there, one state that polls actually got quite right was iowa that you never really fallen behind in that state. but again, it goes to this battleground of the midwest that what watches performing differently than wisconsin or michigan. folks gave reason for that because, iowa is more rural. iowa doesn't have a big population center like detroit or milwaukee. iowa doesn't have as many suburban women because you don't have as many big suburbs, all those were going to protect, ins plate hillary clinton from what was going to happen to her in iowa. obviously that doesn't necessarily look like the case right now. >> it's shout out for ann exceller, the "des moines register." she called it seven points. we have it at six. argument going in as to the way iowa was the exception was that iowa had -- sixth highest high school graduation rate in the country. but 35th in college graduation. this was made for trump in sort of his -- nobody i know said, well, g

we will be back with our >> dickerson: we're back with our politics amy walter, john heilemann, jam heel bowie and mark leibovich. john heilemann, what is going?ln in the race right now. >> it's almost over, john. the blessed day is nearly upon us. what is going on, the races the end. it's the case hillary clinton has never been behind in the race, not for one day sings the general election started. her lead is small but it's the case the clinton campaign feel more confident about where they were then those with the obama campaign in 2012 felt at this stage in 2012. they feel she has a narrow but durable lead. that donald trump is behind has few -- electoral votes. they're not over confident but quite confident they will win on tuesday. >> dickerson: amy, what do you make of the donald trump schedule change? was suppose to be in wisconsin now in michigan and in minnesota. is that a crazy last minute genius or a sign of spreading himself too thin? how do you read it. >> two things. going to john's point about feeling like 2012. moment. a time machine and back to 2012. we're talking about

plus, mark shields, david brooks, amy walter and many others help analyze what it all means. >> woodruffit's election night on the pbs newshour.

i'm joined by tamara keith of npr and amy walter of the cook political report.elcome to both of you. >> thank you. >> woodruff: so we just a few minutes ago saw this video, the trump transition team, released telling us what donald trump plans to do in the early part of his administration after he's inaugurated. he talked about trade, he talked about energy, investigating people who abuse their visas, trying to make sure people aren't here taking jobs away from americans. amy, this is unusual, isn't it? i mean, the election is almost two weeks ago. he has not had a news conference yet. he's done some tweeting. we've seen them greeting people coming to trump tower, and now this. >> the only thing interestingly he said in the video were things he was going to do by executive order. not here is what i'm going to work with congress in the first days. he's come in to roll back the previous administration's executive orders because they're not a rule of law as if they were passed by congress to. your other point about this being unusual, we have to stop treating donal

: amy walter, nine hours we were here together last night.gine seeing each other again so soon. >> i never want to leave her. >> desjardins: thank you for joining us. >> of course. >> desjardins: america is becoming more diverse. we have been talking a lot about race going into this election. that was supposed to help hillary clinton, but what actually happened? >> what we saw from the exit polls is a couple of things. first, donald trump did a little bit better than mitt romney did among white voters. >> desjardins: but not by a whole lot. >> by one point, you will see mitt romney 20 points, donald trump 21 points. but another side of the tore is the african-american and latino percentage clinton got winning by 80 and 36% but not the margins that barack obama got. and there is another story in there as well, and i think that we look at white voters. we have been dividing white voters into these different groups and we've talked a lot about white college educated voters. these are the voters the clinton campaign thought would tip the victory

sreenivasan: also ahead this monday: a special pre-election edition of our politics monday panel-- amy walter, susan page, and andra gillespie on the final sprint. >> woodruff: plus, one year later-- how life for one syrian family has changed since moving to america, the challenges they still face. >> i don't know in which country i would be better, because my family some of them in turkey, me

here to discuss the latest developments: amy walter, of the cook political report, and tamara keith,pr. welcome to you both. for two weeks, no one questioned the outcome of this election, now all of a sudden we have recounts jill stein wants even though she says she doesn't think it will change the outcome, and now president trump are saying there are millions of illegitimate votes even though he offers no evidence. tam, what's going on? >> he's not dispute heg won, he's just saying maybe i would have won the popular vote, too. so i was on a call this morning with the trump transition team. i asked them for evidence -- actual evidence -- of millions of illegal votes where also he was claiming election fraud in three states, where is the evidence in those states? what they presented because report, a study from 2014 that has been thoroughly debunked, and they also presented a pew research study that was about voter roles and housekeeping that could be done in voter roles. neither of those things point to widespread voter fraud in 2016. so his transition team has been unable to offer a

our panel now amy walter, national editor for the cook political report.es krauthamm krauthammer. charles, any thoughts? >> i think it's the right thing. procedurally, not quite, but this the equivalent of him saying, issuing a pardon. and there are a lot of people who are saying, well, what about justice here? well, the point of the pardon power, which is always rather odd in any constitution, is to allow political expediency or, if you like, reasons of state to trump justice. obviously, if you can issue a pardon, you're going around justice but you're saying some things for the country are more important. like the nixon pardon, he might have been guilty, he never was tried. it was done so the country wouldn't have to suffer the long national nightmare anymore and it was the right thing to do which i think many people today who objected at the time recognize. i think it's right to do it. you put that behind us. yes, there are probably offenses which are prosecutable, maybe she would be convicted, but that's not what we want to do. we do not want to see na

our panel now amy walter, national editor for the cook political report. syndicated columnist, charles krauthamm krauthammer. charles, any thoughts? >> i think it's the right thing. procedurally, not quite, but this the equivalent of him saying, issuing a pardon. and there are a lot of people who are saying, well, what about justice here? well, the point of the pardon power, which is always rather odd in any constitution, is to allow political expediency or, if you like, reasons of state to trump justice. obviously, if you can issue a pardon, you're going around justice but you're saying some things for the country are more important. like the nixon pardon, he might have been guilty, he never was tried. it was done so the country wouldn't have to suffer the long national nightmare anymore and it was the right thing to do which i think many people today who objected at the time recognize. i think it's right to do it. you put that behind us. yes, there are probably offenses which are prosecutable, maybe she would be convicted, but that's not what we want to

joining me are amy walter of the cook political report and from the "new york times," yamiche alcindormara keith is away. eight days to go. welcome to both of you. so, aim's thumbs up. >> we're so close. >> woodruff: where does the race stand and how much is this f.b.i. news having? >> seems like the race stands at a place where it's always wanted to go which is basically between a two-point and four-point clinton lead. even before the notes of the f.b.i. investigation came out, we already started to see a tightening of the race that hillary clinton's big, big lead, in some cases double digits, was narrowing down, in part because whenever the focus is on one candidate, the other candidate benefits. for most of october, the focus was on donald trump and all of his problems, whether debates or his other troubles. for the last week, even before the f.b.i. story, it was about the clinton foundation. it was about obamacare rates increasing. what we're starting to see is that republicans started to come home, the focus was on her negative trait. so i think that this race still is a hillary c

charlie: my colleague amy walter wrote a piece this morning. she was ambitious and wrote something. i was too brain addled. what was the phrase she used? fromuoted glen bolger public opinion strategies talking about 2004, that a good field can't make up for bad messaging, i think. and the thing about it is, i think the power of trump's -- the thingped is, clearly the clinton campaign , clearly some things goofed up. first of all, the fact that they did not send her into wisconsin, that minnesota and wisconsin were left sure -- left sort of exposed. and even though she did carry minnesota, but not by much. clearly something went wrong somewhere along the way, and i'm sure we will read a lot about it. trump hast think that found some new way. i think he just had, in retrospect, a very powerful withge that resonated certain types of voters really well. the right message, the right year. i think it was that. is, if i were a republican consultant, i would not tell future republican residential candidates, don't field, do it the way trump did. what's in those car commercials, professional

my colleague amy walter wrote a piece this morning. she was ambitious and wrote something. i was too brain-addled. what was that phrase she used? she quoted glen bolger from public opinion strategies talking about 2004, that a good field can't make up for bad messaging, i think. and the thing about it is, i think the power of trump's messages trumped -- the thing is, clearly the clinton campaign, clearly some things goofed up. i mean, first of all, the fact that they did not send her into wisconsin, that minnesota and wisconsin were left sort of exposed, and even though she did carry minnesota, it was not by much. clearly something went wrong somewhere along the way, and i'm sure we will read a lot about it. no, i don't think that trump has found some new way. i think he just had, in retrospect, a very powerful message that resonated with certain types of voters really well. the right message, the right year. and i think it was that. i mean, i would, my guess is, if i were a republican consultant, i would not tell future republican presidential candidates, "don't worry abou